Comments on: Backcountry Skiing News Roundup

By: Lou

Lou — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 17:12:08 +0000

Thanks Hans, I didn’t know Lacy but now that I’m hearing about the kind of guy he was, man…

By: Hans

Hans — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 16:38:38 +0000

Lacy was an incredible guy to head into the mountains with. I skied one of my first spring couliors with him years ago and it was one of my favorite ski days of all time. He’s going to be missed for a very very long time by the Loveland ski crew.
Hope the powder is bottomless wherever you are amigo.

By: Tims meribel skiing

Tims meribel skiing — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 13:42:55 +0000

That’s pretty amusing! Although you get injuries with all kinds of sports so to say skiing is very dangerous isn’t really fair.

By: Christian

Christian — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 07:16:43 +0000

I have considered whippets, but have a few concerns:
- it seems like it is more likely that I will hurt myself on the whippets than actually being saved by them….it kind of makes “running with scissors” seem like a sane and safe activitiy.
- when falling on skis, what I need to focus on is to get up on those skis. Getting into a self arrest position does not seem to make it less likely that I would end up on my skis….
- when I fall on skis, I do so because I am out of control…and I seldom know what hit me before I get up

I do think the whippets look nice for skinning on icy traverses and for booting…but an ice axe might be a better alternative.

Andrew: I am with Randonnee on this – have you really used the whippets to stop hundreds of falls? Seems like you should take a good look in the mirror and consider what you are doing. I admit that I am a cautious skier…with 100+ ski days a year, I guess I have fallen maybe 20 times the last 10 years. 10 of those have been serious falls, and 5 of those have ended in some kind of injury/being hurt. In none of the falls would a whippet have helped me, as they have taken place at high speeds.

A side note: The Norse godess for skiing was named Skade. The Norwegian word “skade” translates to injury…a coincidence? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skade

By: Randonnee

Randonnee — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 05:36:13 +0000

The Whippets work well for skitouring in my experience. I have used them to self-arrest one highspeed fall on firm snow, glad that I had Whippets

Andrew I cannot resist- ” I’ve used them to stop hundreds of falls “- really? Do you fall that much? Ouch!